


Machiavellian

by Lostalongtheway



Category: American Horror Story
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-30
Updated: 2014-04-30
Packaged: 2018-01-21 09:16:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1545557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lostalongtheway/pseuds/Lostalongtheway
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lana still struggles to escape the talons of Briarcliff while becoming a prisoner of her own mental decay. She can't help but wonder why her lover, Wendy, hasn't tried to contact her. She is haunted by the memories of her wayward lover, the only thing that keeps her afloat. </p>
<p>A new patient withholding dark secrets who is accused of being BloodyFace's lady accomplice is admitted to the asylum by the state of Massachusetts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Machiavellian

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own any of the characters from American Horror Story: Asylum. Thank you for your support.

One

 

"Aren't you sleepy yet?"

"Mm-mm."

The corners of Lana's mouth peeled into the softest of smirks as her slender fingers played with the tips of the other girl's brunette hair. It was damp and sticky at the roots, the ends being shiny and soft like frayed yarn. As she pressed her cheek against Wendy's florid forehead, feeling her lashes brush delicately against her neck, she planted a kiss on her lover's knuckles before stroking over her damp hand. 

"Lana, can you tell me a story?" Wendy's voice hinted coarseness as Lana's fingertips continued to curl around the ends of Wendy's hair like a kitten playing with a spool of twine. 

Lana shifted, still smiling and peering down lovingly at the woman that was curled up at her side. The sheets were damp from Wendy's sweat, her feverish skin hot against Lana's slim body, but she didn't mind. 

"A story. About what?" She expected a fairy tale, something her partner might read to her third graders. 

"Us." Wendy croaked, smiling lightly and moving her head limply to Lana's collarbone. 

Lana looked adoringly at Wendy - her Wendy - and moved her palm to cradle the back of her lover's neck. She opened her eyes to reveal light brown irises that reminded her of chocolates from one of those cocoa advent calendars you can get around Christmas time. She leaned her head on the back of the pillow they shared, Wendy's head still resting comfortably against her shoulder. 

"A story... About us," she paused, rubbing under her nose with her pinky finger, as she always did when she was thinking. "I'll tell you about the house." 

"I'm listening." Mumbled Wendy, yawning and licking her dry lips. 

"It's going to be perfect," started Lana, her voice hushed in the quiet of the late evening - or early morning, however one might look at it. "There will be a pretty little trellis by the back entrance. The kind we saw - remember that garden we visited last spring? The one with the flowers climbing up it. Like Jack and the Beanstalk." 

Wendy smiled crookedly and her eyes fluttered open again, rolling up to meet Lana's. "Clematis and Petunias. What do you think?"

Lana nodded, gently scratching her nails on Wendy's bare arm. "Yeah. And we could plant Black-eyed Susans in the front, huh?" She had already asked these questions to her girlfriend many times. She had told this story enough times that she knew it like the back of her hand. 

"Those would be beautiful, baby." Wendy agreed, sighing deeply. "What about the children..."

"The children?" Lana nearly croaked, brushing her own dark hair off of her pale forehead. "Where do I start?" 

"What will their names be?" 

Lana closed her eyes and when she opened them again, she was watching the shadow of the curtain flapping against the open window. She had opened it before she slipped into bed so Wendy could be cooler, and by now, the middle of the night, it was getting chilly. She curled the blanket up to her chest, making sure at least part of it was tucked around Wendy's torso, even if she was burning up. 

"The first will be named Evelyn. Evelyn Rose." 

Wendy moved her head onto Lana's chest. "We could call her Ev." 

She gulped, nodding. "We'll call her Ev. She'll be beautiful. You could carry her, Wendy." With that, she slid her hand underneath the blankets to rest overtop of Wendy's smooth stomach. She could feel the woman shudder underneath her palm, probably at the coolness of her girlfriend's touch. Lana paused for a moment, thinking of a child. A child that would be their child, no matter what. 

"She'd have your big brown eyes," she continued, gently stroking over Wendy's brow as the other woman waited patiently for her to go on. Lana wondered if she had finally fallen into a feverish sleep, but she stirred and curled her fingers weakly in her palm. "And she'd be beautiful. Even as a baby, anybody would be able to tell how beautiful she is. And she'd be so kind, like you, baby." Continuing to stroke over her hairline, she planted soft kisses along her ear and whispered, "Evelyn would be just like you." 

"But Todd," whispered Wendy hoarsely through her sore throat. She hadn't been able to talk for the last couple days, but plenty of tea had done the trick. "He'd be just like you." Slowly, Lana felt Wendy's smooth hand snaking underneath the hem of her thin nightgown. Lana shuddered as she gently prodded at one of her most sensitive areas, her inner thighs, sliding her palm to rest just below Lana's belly button. 

"Honey," begged Lana, smiling and pressing her cheek to Wendy's head. 

"He'd be just like you," repeated Wendy weakly, letting her imagination whisk her away as she lay ill in Lana's arms. She had a particularly strong immune system but every school year she'd bring home something. She was a teacher, so it was a natural thing to happen. Lana liked to take care of her; Wendy was so sensitive, beautiful, soft. 

"You would carry Todd," whispered Wendy as a breeze blustered the curtains even more, sending a chilly breeze through the room. Lana thought about getting up to close it, but Wendy seemed so comfortable in her arms. She decided against it. "He'd be younger than Evelyn, but he'd still be protective of his sister. In the fall, they would jump off the porch steps into piles of leaves." Wendy's eyes were closed as a smile stretched itself across her pale face. "We'd sit on the porch steps and drink tea. And watch them." 

"Ev would be just like her mother," Lana added again in a mantra, brushing her lips against the brunette's hair. 

"Like both her mothers." Corrected Wendy in her attractively low voice. "I think I'd like to be called Mommy. You could be Mama." 

"That's perfect." Assured Lana, biting her bottom lip to keep from smiling. It was a nice fantasy. But that's all these daydreams were. Fantasies. Figments of their imagination that could never exist. Not in this day and age, at least. But Wendy liked to dream. Spending most of her days with eight-year-olds would do that to you, she assumed. That's probably why she was so hard with everyone beside Wendy - she worked in an office all day, surrounded by occasional coughs, sniffs, and the sound of typewriters constantly tapping away. 

But she enjoyed these soft, intimate moments with her lover. Not the intense lustful moments, but the quiet ones where they wanted nothing more than to be as close as possible to one another. She knew full well that Wendy was a dreamer, but as a journalist, she was a realist. She saw the world as it really was all the time; ugly, twisted, and corroded with corrupted minds and prejudiced people who wouldn't give her a second look. 

Sometimes she wished it was much easier. That they didn't have to closet their relationship. Keep it behind locked doors and closed shades. She simply couldn't understand why the entire neighborhood - why the entire world had to be shaded from the fact that they were lying in the same bed together tonight. 

Just as Lana was about to ask Wendy if she was awake, she felt the weight of her head on her shoulder, the familiar sound of her breath on her neck. She had finally fallen asleep to the sound of their story about their future. Lana stroked the brunette hair out of her sleeping face and positioned her own head on the pillow they now shared, staring up at the ceiling. Wendy let out more than a soft koan in her sleep, curling her fingers in Lana's palm. Lana smiled softly at the ceiling, feeling the moisture in her eyes turn to tears. 

XXX

It was Sunday. At least to Lana's best knowledge, it was. It could get awfully difficult to keep track of the days when everything was so repetitive. The only thing she still had left to remind her of a time where things made sense were the memories of Wendy. The woman who locked her away. Sighing and looking up towards the spiraling cathedral ceiling that ironically resembled the stairway to Heaven, she took a long drag on her cigarette and puffed the smoke towards the record machine that played that irritating song. Nothing but that devious, all-too-cheerful song. 

The tune had become nothing but a distraction to Lana. There wasn't much else to do but sit there and smoke cigarettes until there were no more. At least she had her head, unlike so many here. If she had nothing else, she always told herself, at least I still have this.

Lana hadn't seen Kit in over three days. Still having her sanity, like very few here, she knew better than to think they had taken him in for "therapy". For all she knew, Kit could be concealed deep in the catacombs of Briarcliff, in solitary or strapped to a table with doctors tapping away at his skull, scooping his brain out through his nose like the Egyptians did with their dead. Lana knew Kit wasn't lucky enough to be dead. 

"Lana!" 

Lana responded to the sound of her name being squealed across the room in a high-pitched voice that sounded crushed into he back of someone's throat. She held her cigarette between her index and middle finger, cocking her head behind her as Pepper skidded across the common room towards her, her worn slippers shuffling on the floor as she begged Lana for a playmate. 

Pepper was years older than herself, for all Lana knew, but she acted so much like a child. The poor woman couldn't help it. No one could help the way they were born. 

"Wanna play?" Begged Pepper in her babyish voice. She could barely form sentences but it was easy to make out "Wanna play?" because it was a household phrase for her here at Briarcliff. Lana couldn't blame her. No one could, really. It wasn't her fault that there was nothing here to entertain her. 

"Why don't you go play checkers with Bernie?" Suggested Lana, barely looking at the shaved-headed woman who danced beside her nervously as if she had to relieve herself. Bernie was obsessively moving his checkers in meticulous patterns from one side of the board to the other in diagonals until they were perfect, then moving them back and forth again and again with no satisfaction. He wasn't insane. Just obsessive compulsive, but his family who had put him in this place thought otherwise. 

Pepper cheerfully shuffled over to the man who banged his fingers against the tattered board, hunching over in the chair across from him and sucking on her bottom lip with her large top teeth. 

Lana sighed and leaned back into the couch, curling her legs underneath her. Smoke swirled around her at the finish of her cigarette and she snuffed out the stub with a crunching noise in the ashtray. There were five more in the package left open on the table and just as she stuck a fresh one between her lips and was striking a match to light it, one of the common room doors opened. She turned at the noise of a struggle; something new in this repetitive ward. 

Two guards, dressed in their usual attire, restrained a young woman who was much smaller than Lana. Each had one of her thin arms, keeping her between them as she struggled, making childish tantrum noises as she fought against them like a mustang who didn't wish to be tamed. Lana crossed her legs and watched with slight interest, taking the unlit cigarette out from between her lips and holding it with her thumb against her palm. 

New patients weren't uncommon. Two others had been brought in since Lana had been here, and they were just new fascinations for the doctors to ogle at until someone new was admitted to the asylum. They soon became old news as someone else shiny and interesting took their place. 

The girl screamed in a sudden outburst, claiming most of the patients' attention. Though the guards restrained her arms well, they had no type of restraint on her legs. Suddenly, like the strike of a poisonous snake, she kicked her legs out in front of her, skidding the record player away from the wall. Dominique skipped, startling a few oblivious patients, and as she kicked again with white sneakers, the needle was knocked off the track, stopping the music at once. 

Lana immediately heard the sounds of panic around her; Emma started to rock her doll back and forth very quickly, enough to make it sick if it was real, and Chantelle started to bang her knees against the wall, scraping them raw when the song did not return. Everybody panicked, but Lana just watched with interest. 

"That's enough." Placated Sister Mary Eunice, her tone in annoyance. She knelt down to push the record player back into its place, placing the needle back on the scratched record. Within a few moments of severely painful silence, the piano started to play up beats and down beats, the French words beginning to resonate through the common room. Order was soon returned and things slowly went back to normal, as much as they could be in such an abnormal place. 

The young woman who kicked the record player like a wild bull seemed to have calmed herself in the grasp of the guards who now looked more irritated than ever. Lana lit the cigarette after a few beats of heavy breathing from the new patient, watching the smoke swirl towards the ceiling. 

"Now," spoke Sister Mary Eunice in a soft voice, cupping the girl's chin in her hand. "Tsk, tsk," shaking her head, she forced her head up to look at her. "That's no way to act on your first day, is it?"

"Go to hell." She hissed through clenched teeth, her shoulders hunching as if she might transform into an entirely different creature. Lana didn't doubt it for a moment - she'd seen stranger things here. 

"Oh, honey," the blonde nun leaned in, smiling almost so her lips touched the other girl's forehead. "We all want to go back home." 

The small woman lifted her head and butted Sister Mary Eunice away. A few other patients were watching now, but not as closely as Lana. She expected another outburst but it appeared that Briarcliff had won round one. 

"We can take her back to her cell, Sister." Muttered one of the guards, glaring at the patient. She seemed to have tired herself out. Lana knew that feeling. 

"No," spoke the nun before anyone else could interject. "You don't want a time out before you've even got a chance to be welcomed, do you?"

There was nothing but heavy breathing from the patient. 

"I don't think you want that, Jenny. Do you?" 

She shook her head with a set jaw, her bangs falling sloppily into her face. She couldn't push them away because her arms were still held in vices by the guards. 

"That's a good girl." Sister Mary Eunice smiled lightly, nodding for the guards to release her. Lana half expected her to explode and go off like a wild animal, mostly because it wasn't so uncommon, but she behaved, hunching over herself and staring at the floor. "Ahem," the Sister cleared her throat, though the new patient did not look up. "Don't be rude. Make friends." 

As the nun strode away seductively after giving the girl a little push on the small,of her back, leaving the girl alone in e middle of the floor, she didn't look back at her as she disappeared through the doors which she had come from. The poor girl could have had a spotlight put on her, standing awkwardly there with more pieces of her hair falling into her face. 

Lana leaned back, letting her cigarette smoke in her hand for a moment as she watched the girl shuffling across the floor. She wore relatively new clothes; the average denim dress with a jean collar. It was too big for her and didn't hug her body, rather hung off one of her shoulders. Lana doubted they had a gown that would fit her much better than that one. She was quite small, but not delicate looking. Lana could immediately tell she could hold her own. Her white sneakers fit a little better than the dress, and goose flesh broke out on her arms from the chilly room. Lana rubbed her own arms that were clothed in her red sweater. 

The girl shuffled by Pepper, who was rocking back and forth with yellow yarn in her hands, tangled and like spaghetti noodles. She only gave the microcephalic a sideways glance before she stopped beside a couch that was occupied by Shelley, who had her legs stretched all the way out. She winked at the new girl, who only looked away and traipsed to the collection of seats beside Lana. She sat down stiffly, as if her limbs were made of wood. 

Lana gave her a small smile. It was the least she could do, after all. She was on her side, no matter what she did to get herself in here. She was always against Sister Jude and her impish comrades. 

"Hi," she tried dryly, offering her new company a cigarette. She took it in tiny, thin fingers, struggling to strike a match to light it. Finally, after the third try, she sat stiffly in her chair and took a short drag, coughing. She didn't look like much of a smoker, but then again, neither was Lana. 

After a few awkward moments of silence between the two of them, Lana watched her glare loathingly at the record player that still belted Dominique. She'd become used to it by now and was able to block it out, but she did remember how much it killed her in the beginning to listen to the same thing over and over again. That was just another routine. 

"This song fucking sucks." Muttered the girl, dragging on her cigarette. She seemed to have gotten the swing of smoking by now, at least for the time being. 

Lana agreed. "It will eventually go in one ear and out the other." 

"Eventually?" She scoffed as if she thought Lana was crazy. Lana set her jaw. She had a thing or two to explain to this girl if she thought she was going to rule the roost. "It doesn't matter, I'll be out of here soon. I won't have to get used to it."

Lana reached for another cigarette but decided against it, snuffing out the stub in the ashtray. She remembered a time where she thought Wendy would come and rescue her, like she was a princess trapped in the dragon's lair. An ignorant, naive princess. Wendy hadn't even visited. She locked her away. Probably forever. Lana swallowed her bile and cocked her head at the new girl. 

"Everyone thinks that," she shrugged. There was a time where she might have let her down easy, but it just slipped out, like most things these days. "Until days turn into months." 

She scoffed, holding her cigarette between both fingers. She was quite pretty, Lana noticed. Even with her hair tangled and her face unwashed, she had ideal features. Straight white teeth and light brunette hair with blonde streaks left over from the summer. "It doesn't matter how long I'm here." 

Lana agreed to disagree silently but offered her name. "I'm Lana." 

The other girl did not accept her hand, staring into Lana's waiting eyes questioningly instead of greeting her. "Jen." After a pause, she turned her head away and stared across the room at nothing. Lana assumed she wouldn't be getting much more conversation with Jen today, so she pushed herself up from the sofa and strode towards the doors. 

"I think I'll go and lie down." She assured the guard, and he let her pass. She strode down the long hallways that were once confusing, to the women's ward where her cell was. It felt so much like a prison. She assumed that the cells were once used to house the sickest of tuberculosis patients back when the manor was a cure house. The ones who they didn't want to catch anything from. That's what they treated the patients like now. Like they might catch something from them. 

She sat on her bed and felt the creak of springs underneath her, closing her eyes. It smelled like sweat and bile down here, and as she lay back, her head sunk into the tough pillow. Sometimes when she tried to fall asleep, she remembered what it was like to sleep in her own bed. Her and Wendy's bed. Wendy's arms around her, soft breath against her neck. Her fingers drawing patterns on the bare small of her lover's back as she cooed to her in the night. 

This bed was nothing like that. The equivalency of straw and sticks that did horror for her posture. Her lullaby the howls of deranged patients and screaming from the men's ward that could be heard from anywhere in the asylum. Sometimes she curled into a ball and shuddered, closing her eyes. But it was never with fear anymore. She didn't fear Briarcliff, she knew what it really was. 

"Wendy?" She spoke mostly to herself, gulping. She only ever talked to Wendy, wherever she was, when she was in private. She was already locked inside an asylum to rot, how much more crazy could they believe she was? "I miss you. I wish you'd..." She paused as she heard a shuffle down the hall, followed by a whisper. She ignored it. She had left the door open so she wouldn't be accidentally locked in. "Baby, I just wish I understood." Whispered Lana, lying flat on her bed and looking at the ceiling that was stained in God knows what. 

She closed her eyes. Thinking about Briarcliff's newest patient. As it usually went, most of the newbies were killers who prisons couldn't handle, more had some psychological illness their family thought could be cured by - therapy. She wondered what she'd done to get herself locked up. She certainly wasn't a charmer, that was for sure. But then again, neither was Lana. 

She closed her eyes, trying not to let any tears escape. She told herself, she told herself weeks ago that she wasn't going to let herself cry over Wendy. She forgot all about her, locked in this institution. Maybe hadn't even given her a second thought. Not even after what they went through. What they were together.

Lana felt a tear escape the corner of her eye, sliding coldly down her cheek. She wanted more than anything to have Wendy's comforting arms around her, her lips at the base of her shoulder. The special spot where Wendy kissed her, right where her shoulder and neck connected. She couldn't cry. She simply couldn't. She knew she had to be tough, so why was she crying? 

It wasn't okay to cry, especially after all she'd already been through. She was a big girl. A strong girl. But why did she always falter? Why did she always wish to be so weak, fall into Wendy's warm embrace, delicate kisses. How many times she wished they didn't have to hide their relationship behind locked doors, closed curtains. It was like shoving a key under the mat, but she would give anything for a mere taste of what they had together. A taste of when Wendy called her baby. 

She missed Wendy's voice. The soft murmur in the morning as she turned her head on the pillow to find her there. Always. There was nothing compared to the feeling of Wendy's fingers tangled in her messy hair. It didn't seem fair that she was trapped here with murderers, rapists, mental patients who hallucinated, carried dolls around, banged their heads against walls. She hoped it was worth it to Wendy. But somehow, now, she still forgave her. 

Lana closed her eyes and bit her chapped lower lip, curling her fist against the pillow. It wasn't even evening yet and she felt so exhausted. She fell asleep to the sounds of haunted screams echoing in the women's ward.

XXX

This was fucking ridiculous. The bakery smelled like yeast and bacteria, the horrible smell of disinfectant and dirty bodies. Jen scoffed at the pile of dough in front of her. 

"What the hell am I fucking supposed to do with this?" She called to the nun working at the oven. She wore a slightly charred oven mitt to reach in to retrieve a large wooden pallet filled with loaves of perfect bread. Jen hoped her damn rosary would catch on fire. 

The nun, who she'd been hearing some people call Sister Doris, wiped the sweat from her brow and looked at Jen with concern. Jen didn't care. They could try to "save" her all they wanted, but there was nothing wrong with her. Nothing to be saved. 

"You see how Pepper does it?" Sister Doris said sweetly, trying to be patient. Pepper gave her a buck toothed grin across the table and rocked back and forth, kneading the dough with her large, cro-magnon-like hands. Jen certainly did not return the smile, if you could call it one. She didn't like the ugly pin head knowing how to so something she didn't. It made her feel stupid, which she certainly wasn't. 

"I'll figure it out." She snapped, pushing the nun's hands away with disgust. She already hated the bakery. It gave the faint aura of a concentration camp, what with the dim lighting and large ovens. She was sent here this evening, her second day here. This was supposed to be therapeutic, apparently, but kneading bread dough was anything but relaxing as the radio faintly played Chain Gang. Sam Cooke belted the lyrics as Jen stabbed at her raw hunk of dough as if she were Bloody Face himself. 

She wondered when she'd get to see Bloody Face. After all, he was here. In the same asylum. As her. He didn't scare her, though. Not one little bit. They probably had him in solitary, she told herself. Made sense. Can't have a psycho killer roaming the hallways of a mental institution. There were even psychos of the psychosomatic. But she wasn't one of them. 

"Turn that up," ordered Jen to the pin head, who was still working the lump of dough with her hands. It took her a few moments to comprehend before Jen nodded with annoyance to the radio that sat behind her. The other patients barely looked up from their bread as Pepper turned the dial on the radio. 

Hit the road Jack and don't cha come back no more no more no more no more, hit the road Jack, and don't cha come back no more...

Old woman, old woman, oh you treat me so mean, you're the meanest old woman that I've ever seen,

Well I guess if you say so, I'll just have to pack my things and go. 

"Sing, song!" Squealed Pepper excitedly, nodding up and down and sucking on her bottom lip with her big teeth. 

"Listen up," Jen muttered, tossing her dough aside. "I'd like to dedicate this song to the assholes who locked me away in this hellhole." 

"Jennifer." Sister Doris warned, but Jen ignored her, singing quietly to herself underneath the music. 

"Now baby, listen baby, don't you treat me this way, cause I'll be back on my feet someday," She muttered under her breath to the horrified nun who was trying to wrangle a very excited Pepper who clapped and howled at her newest friend. The other patients mumbled random words to the song too, depressed an diluted tones filling up the room. Her bread dough was covered in dust from her hands but she didn't care - crazy people wouldn't be able to tell the difference between good and bad bread. 

"Get back to work." Insisted the nun in charge of them, going back to tending the oven and leaving them alone. 

Jen was silent now when the nun changed the radio to opera. Obviously the other patients couldn't handle the modern music. Jen hated opera. Sighing, she stuck her elbow in the dough and stared at the swinging light fixture that distributed light across various places in the dim, damp room. It seemed like hours passes as she watched the nun disappear back into the kitchen to prepare plates for supper. 

She got up and paced to into the utility room where she saw the Sister carry a stack of metal trays and found herself surrounded by rows of kitchen supplies. She shuddered at the sudden coldness of the room and looked back to make sure Pepper and the other patients were pretty occupied with their bread. She slipped into the main kitchen where a few other patients prepared plates, slopping - whatever that was - onto plates and distributing bread. One of them, a girl with slightly shaggy Carmel hair, looked up at her but didn't give her a second glance.

Looking around the kitchen, she located a drawer of silverware that had been left open. Jen slinked to the counter and eyes the large bread knives sitting out in the open, just waiting for her. Waiting for her. She picked one up. 

"What's that you have there, Jenny?" Sister Mary Eunice smiled seductively at Jen, who dropped the knife with a clatter, wheeling around. The nun caught her wrist, raising her delicate eyebrows, trying to look innocent, but her icy blue eyes said otherwise.

She winked at Jen. "Look at you, hot stuff." 

Jen's heart was racing a million miles a minute. She never knew why she acted so brave when all she really was was afraid. 

Sister Mary Eunice smoothed down the front of her robe, waiting for her to say something. "Jenny?" 

Jen started to back away from her piercing eyes, stumbling backward onto her behind, backing away on the dirty floor and into the counter. Sister Mary Eunice, surprisingly strong, dragged her forcefully from the room rather than calling guards to do it while the patients on kitchen duty watched diligently without a word. Jen struggled like a wildcat, scratching and clawing, making animal like noises, but the nun seemed unfazed by her behavior, dragging her up flights of stairs. 

"Sister Jude," she spoke through clenched teeth, holding Jen under her arm. She was so child sized and it was so easy, like holding onto a struggling child. She opened the door, throwing the victim onto the floor and closing it after her. Sister Jude, a rather erect nun with her hands folded in front of her stood at the window, crossing over to the squirming struggler on the ground that spluttered like a fish out of water. 

"Jennifer..." Sister Mary Eunice shook her head, stepping on her hand. Jen let out a pained cry and rocked herself on the floor, pressing her chin to the floor rug in pain. "Sister Jude, our newest patient has been quite the rebel." 

Sister Jude shook her head, her piercing eyes trained on the crying subject. She felt like one of Henry the Eighth's wives that was about to be executed. For some reason, she felt like she might be crucified by the woman. She had a very strong presence. 

"You'll learn here at Briarcliff that your actions have consequences." She crossed to a large cabinet on the wall, one that reminded Jen of one she might keep pool rods in. She gulped as Sister Jude chose a thin cane that was washed a light birch color. To her surprise and astonishment, the nun forced her up off the ground and with a grunt, threw up her dress to expose her bare backside. Jen cringed and moaned out a name, any name, desperately.

"Lana!" She screamed, searching for an ally. The only one she knew the name of. The only one who didn't have crazy in their eyes. "HELP ME! Please, no, Lana! don't let them do this to me! Please, sister, NO-"

Sister Jude laughed slightly. "You think miss - Lana Banana is going to help you? That club of a woman's been in here plenty of times herself. Repent for your sins, Jennifer, and maybe my God will allow you a second chance." 

"Please. Don't." She begged one last time, though she knew it was too late.

She only heard the swish of the switch against the air as it came up, and felt the stinging whack of the wooden blade as it smacked her in the behind. It was even harder than she expected. Crying out, she let out a choked sob and reached for something, anything. She grinned the Bible that lay on Sister Jude's desk, holding onto it for dear life. 

"Lana, please! Please, help me! No, oh-! Help!" She begged, but that stranger Lana wasn't coming for her. No one was.


End file.
